cord blood

I have been trying to donate my babies cord blood and made many phone calls and finally found a donation program that was able to help, so I went on their website and downloaded the enrollment form. I answered a lot of the questions until I came to the ones of immediate family cancer and disease. I stopped. I told Jake we probably weren't qualified because of Chloe's cancer. I called before I filled out anymore information and mine isn't qualified because of immediate family cancer. I was bummed out. I really feel this is important for reasons that are known, so I am going to post their website and any of you who can or know someone who wants to donate cord blood and is healthy and has no immediate family cancer, and your doctor is willing, please donate (you will also need to call them to see if the company is able to get the blood from the hospital you deliver at. Small Logan was on their list surprisingly). It doesn't cost any money and it may save a life one day.

http://www.cryo-intl.com/enroll/donating/

she is still a girl

I made another utlrasound because I wanted to make sure about a few things, including the gender :). She still is a girl, and the tech said that she is practing breathing, which means she is a happy baby. I wanted to check to see how she was doing because I was having some pain, and I didn't gain my normal amount of weight in the second tri that I usually do. Everything looks good and the pain is not associated to the placenta or baby. Ultrasounds are always hard to tell what the baby is doing, but in the first picture I posted because her arm is covering her nose and you can see she has her mommies elbows. Pointy and sharp.
This one is really hard to tell where she is at. The darker part she is folding her arm and they covers her mouth. You can see a little bit of her eye, and her nose. The folding of her arms that she is a peaceful baby fools you because she is a mover, she wouldn't stop moving for the tech, and the tech kept mentioning she wouldn't stop moving. (Elsie was this way, so she maybe another bundle of energy this one!)
I am glad I made another ultrasound, this one went how it was suppose to at 20 weeks. I was so shocked over the gender, and had to take a while to swallow she being a girl. I don't have to send back the cute bedding I bought for her or redo the room I have finished for her. Now we just wait. My 30 week apt is tommorow.

we love fall

Can you believe that my boy doesn't want his picture taken. Well I didn't torture him, so the ones of Rhen are from the day before wheelin with his daddy. I am trying to get better at this picture taking stuff, there is just so much to remember and I don't have all the equiptment, but with such cute kids, they make the picture!!


Rhen in his wheelin and motorbike ridin hat. Love it!

Character, this one.

Rhen kept coming into the kitchen for crackers. I thought he was just hungry but it turns out his intentions were purely recreational.

He's usually the passenger so when he drives his 4Wheeler he decided he must have a passenger. He insisted that mom get on. It was a little sqwishy with Stacie's baby belly.

fulfilling a promise

After Jeff made me hold this pose for a really long time without telling me why, i promised i'd make a painfully obvious photochop to make it look like i dropped the castle in the water. Here is the fulfillment of that promise. People don't realize it, but it's tourists throwing castles in water that leaves them in ruin, not these so called "wars" that supposedly took place back in the day.

Jeff has some nice pics i didn't have before, so if you missed them on his blog, here they are.

Random Chlo

Chloe randomly fired out this comment in conversation at grandma and grandpa's dinner table at the WY homestead:

Chloe: "Dad, i suppose you'd probably like a Deringer wouldn't you?"

(pronouncing it der - ring - er)

Impressed with her word usage, but confused at the pronunciation my dad and I looked at each other, then asked her to repeat it. She did.

"You mean Deringer Chlo?" (the small percussion handgun designed by Henry Deringer (1786-1868) and produced from 1852 through 1868.)

"A Der-ring-er Dad, you know, a pistol."

"Yes Chlo, if I had a need for a pistol I think a Deringer would be great."

BIG boy

Since we are going to be adding a new baby in a few weeks I decided to try a big boy bed for Rhen (just a big matress on the floor until his bed gets made, thanks to Josh). I was worried about it because it is in a different room and I didn't have much success with Elsie. She would never stay in her bed, she would take off her diaper and drop a surprise for me on the floor, scale the dresser causing it fall on her and the usual of crying and crying and crying. Well Rhen has done the exact opposite. He stays in his bed and falls asleep and never plays around, even in the morning he is still on his mattress when I go in to get him. Such a good boy. Tonight I was getting him ready for bed and he saw that I got his cup of milk and his blanket so he ran into his big boy room and jumped on his bed. How sweet.
Tonight instead of reading him a story I decided to sing him a song. So I started to sing, and 30 seconds into it he said, "Mommy, Mommy?" and I said, "what" and then he said, "Stop."
So I guess he didn't want a song. I said goodnight closed the door, and that was that.

a simple favor

I am worried this year about all these little cancer fighters (not just Chloe but the many others we know) who have to brave this winter with low counts and scary situations with the swine flu, pneumonia and germs, and was wondering if you can keep them in your prayers. My heart just worries for these sweet children who not only have to fight off this disease, but in doing so cannot fight these nasty germs that go around. From first hand experience of having a sweet child of cancer, I know the worry and the fight these kids have to go through, so this up coming winter season please remember these little ones that face this swine flu and pneumonia.

thank you.


ps a big shout out to chloe - two years cancer free this week...yahoooo chloe!
I was just looking through old pictures remembering it all so here is a look back.
4 yrs old, just after diagnosis

admitted with the chickenpox during chemo round 1

Chloe's Make-a-Wish day

Cute Smile enhanced with steroids, round 2

Silly sisters just a few weeks after Cancer came back for round 2

Finally back in school after 2yr break.

too much to do with too little time...or maybe is that energy

There are so many things I would love to do, like be a cool blogger and have the ability to down load the big pictures, changed the blogger heading all on my own. But as it turns out I don't have the energy to learn so I ask my able, loving husband to do this for me, and the list goes on...
I wish I could keep my house spic and span at least one day of the week.
I wish I could keep Rhen out of my chapstick, gum, beauty products and the x-box.
I wish I would finish one project before I start another, or at least have the energy to.
I wish I had the energy to sew cool things, like a bedding set for my new born girl, who is one her way (but I bought it instead, which I really love).
I wish I had energy to download pictures to ebay so I can sell some stuff or just download any pictures at all to put on the blog, or put new friends that I have met as links on my blog.
I wish I had the energy to cook, normally this time of year I love to cook but not this year.

But I guess with 4 kids, a big belly with one of my kids in it and being over 30 it pretty much sucks all my energy out, to learn to do stuff, or accomplish anything at all. So I tell Jake, that for now, things will just have to wait, and thanks for helping me blog.

Brown Eyes, Blond Hair

mucus test results

Well the mucus in her nose that was taken out on tuesday came back postive for H1N1.
That isn't something I wanted to hear to day but I am glad to get her on antibiotics before it gets any worse than a cough and stuffy nose. No fever, just tired and not feeling herself and some mucus.
So she is out of school for the time being to get her better and rid of this flu(and of course so as not to spread). I thought they would admit her, but we are glad we can just deal with it at home and hope no fevers come.

ps she got the go ahead to get her ears pierced on tuesday if she cleaned them really good andif they did get irrated she would have to be on more meds. She agreed and was pretty excited, so we surprised her on the way home and got them peirced. She voted that getting her blood drawn was way worse than getting her ears peirced.

For Uncle Jeff

Jeff's a huge ManU fan, so these are for him. Funny how Rhen has the same expression on his face when he plays sports - whether he's under pressure or celebrating a goal.

Somethings you never forget, unless you do.

Today was Onc Clinic day for Chloe. She had a bone density infusion which took a couple of hours so to pass the time she mapped out every possible configuration of sandwich you could make using turkey, ham, roast beef and cheese. She hasn't been feeling very well lately (stuffy nose and whatnot) so they decided to take a sample from her runny nose to test it. To do this they brought out some tools that brought back a lot of memories. As Chloe finished figuring out her sandwich chart, I remembered a scary night we had a couple of years ago.

It was a particularly rough day. She had been having complications with some of the meds she was on and had a staff infection in her lungs. That night she had a reaction and suddenly couldn't breathe. I ran to the door and called the nurses. Her doctor and 5 or 6 nurses barged into the room with some equipment in a panic. They put a tube up her nose and one down her throat and pumped her stomach out. Then they gave her a series of drugs to bring her blood pressure back down and stabilize her. I don't know if it was the fear of what could happen, or just seeing her helpless and gagging as they inserted the tubes - but I just about passed out and hit the floor. The doctor on call stayed in the room with us that night for several hours so she could keep an eye on Chloe and luckily everything was ok. I was teary eyed today thinking about it and interrupted Chloe's sandwich categorization to ask her if she remembers that night, if she remembered the tools they had to use.

She has no recollection that it ever happened.

jet lag is a drag

We had a lot of fun on our trip, good company, good weather (for this time of year we are told) good food (escpecially the fudge doughnuts), and awesome scenery! We have a lot of fun memories we will rememeber forever. I won't bore you with the inside jokes, but we laughed pretty hard about them throughout the whole trip. The history in that place is amazing, everything is old and has stories to be told and it was fun to see them and hear about them. I really enjoyed Bath, Les Mis. (taking place in a theater probably built in the same time the story took place), the Salisbury Cathedral in England, the phone boothe that was in the middle of no where, the funny signs for the elderly, the accents of the people, getting locked in the grocery store employee bathroom (which I thought I was going to be locked in there forever so that wasn't such a fun memory at the time),finding a fudge doughnut, the old shops, the beautiful scenery and the smell (a woodsy like smell), wondering where Cindy went to, keeping up with Jeff's speed walking, and listening to Jake and Jeff's sense of humor, that I love.

The flight home for me was brutal! I am still recovering from jet lag. Jake and I figured we were up on that day for 26 hours!! Wow those were long flights. Three total, and after every layover the plane seemed to get smaller and smaller. On wednesday night we both fell asleep where we were sitting at 7:30 and woke up at midnight to no power in our house and guessing our kids just put themselves to bed. Our kids said they had fun playing a game in the dark with a lite candle (so grateful nothing happened with that lite candle).

It was so fun! I am so glad we got the chance to go and again thanks to Cindy for always having a map, and for Jeff for driving, especially in London, even though we didn't get out of the car when beckoned to. :)

The UK Tour.

Stacie and I went to the UK with Jeff and Cindy for a few days and had a great time and lots of laughs. Many thanks to Jeff and Cindy for acting as our tour guides; and to Spence, Tal and Kinsey who took care of our kids while we were gone. We spent several days in England seeing the popular historical sites, then saw a great deal of Scotland as we traveled the countryside. I was in charge of uploading some pics. I'll let Stacie tell more about the trip. I've included a link to some pics at the bottom of the page and here are a few teasers.

See more pictures here.